TODAY: Cal State San Bernardino to host lecture on Japanese Americans' incarceration

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SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. - Cal State San Bernardino will kick off its fall quarter "Conversations on Diversity" lecture series with "The Mass Incarceration of Japanese Americans," presented by professor Lane Ryo Hirabayashi of University of California, Los Angeles.

The lecture, presented by CSUSB' s University Diversity Committee, will be held today, Thursday, Nov. 19, from noon to 1:30 p.m. on campus in the Santos Manuel Student Union Events Center. Admission is free and open to the public.

Hirabayashi, chair of the Asian American Studies department at UCLA, will address the implications of Executive Order 9066, which incarcerated more than 110,000 people of Japanese ancestry after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941.

The renowned scholar has focused much of his research on the subsequent post-World War II campaign of Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated to seek redress and a national apology.

Hirabayashi, who earned his Ph.D. in socio-cultural anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley, has conducted much research in the Japanese American experience, allowing him to blend his interest in the topic with his professional career.

In 2006, Hirabayashi was appointed the endowed chair of the "George and Sakay Aratani Professorship of the Japanese American Internment, Redress and Community" at UCLA after a year-long international search.

His latest book, "Japanese American Resettlement Through the Lens," was published earlier this year. It features a unique collection of photographs compiled in the War Relocation Authority recounting the lives of Japanese Americans after leaving the camps.

Other books by Hirabayashi include "The Politics of Fieldwork: Research in an American Concentration Camp" and "Inside an American Concentration Camp: Japanese American Resistance at Poston, Arizona."

Cal State San Bernardino's University Diversity Committee strives to foster a campus community that values diversity by promoting activities and programs, such as the "Conversations on Diversity" lectures, to further the understanding of diversity.

The lecture is co-sponsored by CSUSB's departments of Academic Computing and Media, Human Resources, Parking Services, Sociology, Undergraduate Studies, the College of Natural Sciences, the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, and the Access Committee.

For more information or to request special accommodations, contact Twillea Evans-Carthen at (909) 537-5138 or Mary Texeira at (909) 537-5547.

For more information about Cal State San Bernardino, contact the university's Office of Public Affairs at (909) 537-5007 and visit the news Web site at news.csusb.edu.

The Mass Incarceration of Japanese Americans, presented by professor Lane Ryo Hirabayashi of University of California, Los Angeles, is scheduled for Nov. 19 at Cal State San Bernardino.